Category: school

Well, I didn’t expect to be back so soon with this, but I so enjoyed the first Smile time that I had to discover just where those children lived.

They are from Podersdorf am See, a small market town in Austria with a population of only about 2,500. They are very near to the Slovakia and Hungary borders, so my guess at East European was pretty accurate.

They have what appears to be a fantastic primary school with a fine musical tradition, and here they are, with my Smile time #2, singing “Good Morning, Did you sleep well? I love the anticipation of the percussionists!

Time again for Kat Myrman’s wonderful challenge to tax our creativity. Just take her photo prompt and write a story, inspired by it, in 280 characters or fewer.

Here is this week’s prompt and my contribution. Check out all the fabulous entries here and, if you’ve never had a go, why not try a story of your own? You may surprise yourself!

By KleineKiwi at Pixabay.com

Laura the lamb was really embarrassed. Late for school, yet again!It was bad enough that her Mum insisted on taking her every day, always waiting outside the gates, there for everyone to see.No other Mum had 2 bodies; and why did the legs always try to go in different directions?

In the Summer of 1962, at the age of 14, I travelled to Germany, with the Combined Cadet Force from my school, for a Summer Camp.

It was quite an adventure to get there. We travelled by military steam train, with the carriages being loaded onto the ferry for the channel crossing. It must have been very nearly the last such journey.

We eventually arrived at 2 Division Signal Regiment, in Bünde, West Germany, a Regiment I was later to be posted to as a regular soldier.

The Crossed Keys of 2 Division

There were still National Servicemen who had been conscripted into the forces for 2 years. These were the last of a dying breed as the last National Servicemen left the armed forces in May 1963.

I well remember that the soldiers took great delight in plying us with beer, probably at our own expense. That Summer, far from home, was the first time that I became extremely drunk, and extremely unwell.

We obviously overdid the cigarettes too. When I returned home I suffered, for a few days, with what was diagnosed as nicotine poisoning!

During our 10 days there we went out on exercise with the Regiment and did all sorts of, what was to us young boys, very exciting things. We helped camouflage vehicles, laid large capacity cables, helped put up radio masts, slept in abandoned barns and spent a day with the German Army.

It was during this “exchange day” that I encountered the DUKW (duck) that was to transport us down the river. (For the technically minded, more information here)

Ten very excited teenagers squeezed into the restricted space at the back and were driven down a ramp, into the water, where we progressed at a very sedate pace for 20 minutes or so, driving back up another ramp to dry land.

To be honest it was a bit disappointing, certainly not as exciting as the next half hour when we were transported at some considerable speed back up river, sirens wailing, in a fast patrol craft.

We then experienced a German Army lunch, for many, the first ever taste of “foreign” food. Tepid cabbage soup, cold würst, sauerkraut, black bread, and a strange pudding of yogurt. A new experience that was not repeated until it became more commonplace in the UK.

Postscript

In fact the river in question may not have been the Rhine. Memory being what it is, it could have been the Mösel, or even the Wëser. I have travelled on all of these, but, at the time, it seemed to be a very wide, and busy, river.

Read this wonderful post from Kirsty. I bet her 6YO learns far more by doing this than other children do by giving cards and presents to their teacher. I also bet that the teacher will cherish the letter greatly.

I hope you don’t mind, but 6YO won’t be coming into school on her last day on Tuesday armed with a ‘thank you teacher’ card and present. It’s not because we don’t appreciate you, but just because I suspect that with 30 children in the class, you’ll be getting more cards and chocolates than you can comfortably carry to your car in one journey.

It must have been the summer of 1961. Certainly before the Beatles. The music that year was all Dean Martin and the Drifters, or itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini.* And I recall being in love with a girl in the 4th form at Queens’s school in Rheindalen, Carol, and constantly singing a song to her called “Oh Carol”.** And there was Elvis of course. Anyway, I was in the boy scouts then. Moved on I had from the cubs, left behind all that Akela and dib dib, dib, dob, dob, dob stuff. Cubs had sixers in charge. I had been a sixer when a cub. Born to command I was. Now, in that summer of ’61, I had graduated to the scouts and I was quickly made a Patrol leader. Sometimes I even wore long trousers.